Fire
by redhairandbookss
Summary: You see, it was because She was brilliant, he was cunning, her hair was red, his was blonde, she read too much, he cursed too much, she was brave in a backhanded sort of way, he was brave in every way, he lived a life of no regrets, and she learned from him that a life with no regrets is undoubtedly the best kind of life there was or ever could be.


All This and Heaven Too ~ Florence and the Machine

And the heart is hard to translate

It has a language of its own

It talks in tongues and quiet sighs,

And prayers and proclamations

In the grand days of great men and the smallest of gestures

And short shallow gasps

But with all my education I can't seem to command it

And the words are all escaping, and coming back all damaged

And I would put them back in poetry if I only knew how

I can't seem to understand it

And I would give all this and heaven too

I would give it all if only for a moment

That I could just understand the meaning of the word you see

'Cause I've been scrawling it forever but it never makes sense to me at all

She looked pretty.

He was always downright gorgeous.

She was brilliant.

He was cunning.

Her hair was red.

His was blonde.

She read too much.

He cursed too much.

She thought a lot.

He didn't stop for a moment until he met her.

She was brave in a backhanded sort of way.

He was brave in every way.

She was precise.

He was impulsive.

He used to smoke.

She hated it.

He was sly.

She was too.

He lived a life of no regrets.

She learned from him that a life with no regrets is undoubtedly the best kind of life there was or ever could be.

Whatever this story is, it is first and most importantly a love story. A highly unlikely love story, but a love story all the same. Love and hate are a fine line, the same way that friends can slowly melt into lovers, and the same way that the stars come out: slowly, then suddenly.

They were fires, they were stars; they burnt short but undoubtedly bright.

December 15, Year 7

"WON'T YOU JUST BLOODY SHUT UP," Scorpius bellows at her, balling his fists. Rose scowls and pouts.

"NO! WHAT IS _WRONG_ WITH YOU?!"

"What is wrong with _you?" _he says, glaring knives at her, "You almost said you'd go out with _Cormack McGaffin._ You don't even _like_ Cormack McGaffin."

"SINCE WHEN DO YOU DICTATE WHO I LIKE OR DON'T LIKE?"

"...I never said I did-"

"CORMACK MCGAFFIN IS ACTUALLY A GOOD FRIEND OF MINE WHO I MAY OR MAY NOT FANCY," Rose screams. Scorpius presses his fingers to his temples before he grabs Rose's wrists and holds them behind her back. Rose struggles at first, but slowly, her scowl fades away as Scorpius draws far closer than he's ever been to her.

She notices his faint scent of oranges, cinnamon, and smoke, and she remembers that he had oranges and a bowl of oatmeal for breakfast. A single strand of pale, blond hair falls over his stormy gray eye.

"What _is_ it with you today?" Rose mutters, blowing a stray fire-red hair out of her eyes. He just looks her face up and down, searching, frantically searching for any part of her that might have melted a little bit, any part of her that feels the same way he does.

"Do... do you actually like Cormack?" he says, breathing the scent of oranges and cinnamon onto her face. His breath is warm and inviting, so she closes her eyes, and wrestles her hands free from his grasp. She buries her face in her hands.

"I- I don't know-"

"It matters to me, Rose, it does-"

"WHY?" she screams, suddenly taken aback, she steps away from him, something flashing in her eyes, "IT SHOULDN'T, SCORPIUS-"

"AND WHY SHOULDN'T IT, ROSE?! WHY CAN'T I-"

"DON'T YOU DARE SAY IT, YOU DON'T, YOU DON'T!" He throws his hands up in the air and scowls at her, then walks close to her, so close that she can see every detail on his face, from his jawline to the little flashes of blue in his cloudy eyes.

"I'LL SAY IT IF I WANT TO SAY IT, ESPECIALLY BECAUSE IT'S THE TRUTH-"

"NO! YOU DON'T! YOU'RE MY BEST MATE, YOU'RE NOT ALLOWED TO-"

"STOP INTERRUPTING ME!"

"STOP INTERRUPTING _ME_!" He glares daggers at her, and she does the same to him, but his grey eyes are far too strong, far too bright, and she melts as she sinks down to the ground crying.

He follows her, wrapping his arms around her convulsing figure.

"Why? Why can't I, Rose?" he whispers, his lips grazing her ear. She just sobs harder, and he just holds her tighter.

"Be-Because... I-I've never known any other way... We're just friends... you don't- you don't e-even fancy, m-me, r-right?" He smiles faintly, his face in her hair. When he doesn't respond, she pushes him away, and glares at him, crossing her arms across her chest. "ANSWER ME RIGHT NOW, YOU PANSY!"

"I fancy you, Rose Weasley. I fancy you. And you, you don't have a say in-"

"SHUT UP, SHUT UP, SHUT UP!"

"I FANCY YO-"

And then he does shut up. Because at that moment, she presses her soft rosebud lips against his solid, hard mouth, and they sit there for a while, their lips moving together in harmony. His hand cups her face, and she runs her delicate fingers through his blond hair.

She pushes him away after a while, and after smiling for a moment, she remembers that she's supposed to scowl, and she does.

"You aren't going to honestly pretend that this didn't just happen are you... don't you dare sit there looking all sad and depressed because hell, you just kissed me and I kissed you and HELL and you-"

"Ijustdidittoshutyouup, ididn'tmeanit," Rose splutters, reaching out a pale hand and wiping his lips, "Itdidn'thappen." He takes her hand and grips it like it's a lifeline.

"You can't take that back, Rose, that... -you can't ignore me," he says softly, "You _kissed_ me."

"I don't know what the hell I was thinking, I-"

"You just don't want to screw it up? You don't want us to end up hating each other? Well-"

"Don't you dare say you won't screw it up, you screw _everything_ up."

August 28th, Year 1

Rose was a practical sort of girl. She liked to be very organized. She was the type of girl that would spend all day color-coding and alphabetizing her schoolwork.

When she first saw Scorpius Malfoy, laughing with her cousin across the train station, she knew immediately that they would clash.

It was like wearing purple and red: it's striking, and you can't really tell if the two colors go together. It was like setting two magnets together and watching them push apart, then finally forcing them together.

His appearance didn't necessarily please her. He had pale blond hair that she thought was rather unruly and disorganized: it mismatched her own perfectly groomed red locks that she attended to with great care. He had grey eyes and pure white, perfect teeth; she had electric blue eyes and quite large, crooked teeth. He was handsome, for a eleven year old, at any rate. One of his shoes weren't tied, and his shirt was untucked. She could tell by the way he walked, a kind of sway in his step and a flash of those perfect teeth, that he meant trouble.

She knew that Scorpius Malfoy was no goody-two-shoes.

Her cousin, James, was not much different from Scorpius. James had a mop of messy black hair and striking green eyes. Rose thought he looked almost exactly like pictures of his grandfather, the first James.

Rose and James were close. Rose was closer to him than she was to Lily, or Albus, or Hugo. If someone was rude or mean to her, the first person she would tell would be James.

James was certainly, but not recognized as, her best friend.

"...that's Scorpius Malfoy...make sure you beat him on every test..." Rose heard her father say to her. She wasn't really listening though, she was too busy watching people pass through the barrier.

They were there... and then they weren't.

"...Ron! Don't turn them on each other _yet_ the school year hasn't even started...," her mother said, fiddling with Rose's hair. Rose pushed her mother's hand away before she turned around to face her parents, beaming.

"Bye! I'll try not to drink too much, or smoke too much or anything, I'll be sure not to study for any tests, and I'll get perfect grades!" Rose said sarcastically, as she played with the little figurine of the Eiffel Tower that her cousin Victoire had given her.

Hermione didn't laugh at Rose's comment.

"Young lady, don't even joke about that-" Hermione's hair blew in her face, and she tucked a curly strand behind her ear.

"-Now Rose, have fun, say hi to Hagrid for your mum and I, brush your teeth, and don't get too friendly with the Malfoy boy. Grandad Weasley would never forgive you if you married a pureblood," Ron chuckled. Rose scowled in disgust; she didn't even like the look of the bloke, she didn't understand why her parents were giving her such a hard time about him. To her, he was just another boy in her grade.

The nearby church bells chimed twelve o'clock. Rose turned her cart around and walked toward the barrier.

"Bye Mum! Bye Dad! I'll miss you!" she called over her shoulder as she walked through the barrier and onto Platform 9 and 3/4.

Once on the train, Rose scanned the available compartments for someone she recognized. When she saw James and Scorpius seated together in the third train car, she wheeled her belongings into the compartment with them.

The boys were having a heated discussion about the different houses, James was fervently defending Hufflepuff while Scorpius attacked it.

"...what if YOU get put in Hufflepuff? Then will YOU be a loser and a pushover?"

"...er... Of course not! I'll probably discover that Hufflepuffs are great in many ways that aren't obvious to the other houses-"

Rose seated herself next to her cousin who didn't acknowledge her presence; it was as if she hadn't come into the room at all, she was invisible to them.

After the discussion had gone on for quite a while and the train was about to leave, Rose finally lost it.

"WILL THE BOTH OF YOU JUST BLOODY SHUT UP?!" Rose hollered at them. James still didn't acknowledge her, he just scowled at Scorpius. Scorpius looked petrified as his eyes washed up and down her, he took in every aspect of her.

Scorpius thought she was bloody brilliant. (And she was, of course.) He liked the ferocity of her gaze, and her liked the freckles that were scattered across her face. He liked the way her nose swooped upwards like a ski-jump, and he liked her hair.

She seemed ferocious in a brave kind of way, and she seemed strong. He knew that she wasn't someone he wanted to mess with.

From the very first moment he saw her, Scorpius knew that Rose Weasley was someone who he would very much like to be friends with.

After it had been silent for a few moments, Scorpius finally spoke.

"Pleasure to meet you. I'm Scorpius Malfoy," he said holding out his hand. Rose glowered at him in annoyance, but after looking at him in his eyes for a few brief seconds, she finally melted, and accepted the handshake.

His eyes, those glorious grey eyes, would be her weakness for years to come.

"I'm Rose. Rose Weasley," she said, eyeing him before adding, "And I suppose you've met my cousin." She gestured to James. James's face was blank, he showed no emotion.

"Hey, Rose," James sighed weakly. Rose didn't reply, she just looked out the window and watched the trees and grass pass by in a blur of color. It looked like a watercolor painting that someone had accidentally spilled water all over, mixing the colors together in the wrong places.

"It's pretty, isn't it?" Rose commented subconsciously. The clouds hung low that day, almost like a fog.

Scorpius did not find the fog beautiful, he thought it looked dull and sad. It reminded him of his grandfather.

Scorpius did not like his grandfather much at all.

"I don't think it looks pretty," Scorpius blurted quickly. He cleared his throat before looking down at his shoes. "It looks... sad."

"Sad can be pretty," she said sternly, "What house are you hoping for? Not Hufflepuff, I guess, right?" Scorpius smiled broadly before answering.

"Gryffindor," he said.

Scorpius was proud that he wanted to be in Gryffindor. It made him feel like he was different than his father, it made him feel rebellious. He liked feeling rebellious; Scorpius Malfoy did not like to follow rules, he didn't like to go with the sway of things.

"Really?" Rose said, surprised, "Me too. I like the colors best." Scorpius frowned.

"I think I quite like Ravenclaw's colors, but I know that I'm not smart enough to get into that one-"

"You're pretty smart, Scor," James interrupted, "You don't give yourself credit for how smart you are." Scorpius smirked a little, and Rose frowned.

She didn't like how cocky and arrogant he was, even though he wasn't half bad.

Rose thought that she might like to be Scorpius Malfoy's friend.

He was a little bit of a prat, a little bit of a rebel, and a little bit of ice to her fire, and God only knew how much she needed someone like that to balance her out.

"Are you going to try to play Quidditch this year, James?" Scorpius asked, reclining in his seat casually. James shrugged.

"I don't know if I'll make it, even if I do try out. I know they've loosened the rules about first years but even still, I don't think I'd make the team-"

"Are you bloody stupid or something? You're incredible!"

"I'm eleven. There are blokes out there that are seventeen and three-million times as strong as I am."

"C'mon, James! Where's your taste for adventure?" Scorpius said, smirking, "I bet you're not even going to go into the Forbidden Forest with me this year." James's eyes narrowed.

"I bet we'll have to go for detention..."

"Psh," Rose said, laughing, "You guys are already planning that you'll have detentions..." James and Scorpius looked at her like she was crazy.

"If you don't get detentions, then you're not really living," Scorpius said like it was the most obvious thing in the world, "If you have no regrets, then you can do whatever you'd like."

"If you do what you like, then you get into trouble," Rose said. She was sure now that she had been right about him, Scorpius Malfoy absolutely _was_ trouble, but she kind of liked it. She liked how he wasn't afraid of much, and she liked how he was rebellious. It reminded her of everything she wanted to be, but was too afraid to become.

"Getting into trouble is worth it," James said, "Trust us. Really. You should hang out with us this year, Rose, you might loosen up a bit, and God knows you need that." Rose scowled and pouted at him then playfully slapped him on the arm. They all laughed.

"I was already planning on it," she said, beaming at their invitation.

"Are you ready for this, then?" Scorpius said seriously, "Dragons, mystical castles, brave knights in shining armor, lots of getting into trouble, _detention_..." Rose laughed.

"Sure am."

"We need a name, if we're all going to hang out," Scorpius decided, looking down at the ground.

"Like a club?" James offered. Scorpius shook his head.

"No... like a group name, I suppose." James's eyes lit up, and Rose knew at once what he was excited about.

All his life, James had practically worshipped his grandfather, even though he'd never met him. He loved the way his dad had described him: he had had three close friends: they were never afraid to have a little fun, even with a consequence, and they had called themselves the Marauders. James loved the idea of the Marauders.

"Let's be... the-"

"Oh! I was reading the other day-" Rose started before James cut her off.

"...What's new...," he grumbled. Rose smiled at him before continuing.

"...And I read about this witch who helped liberate the goblins in 1954, her name was Luciana Bellatores. She fought for witches rights in the early 1930's too, and she has given a lot of speeches about muggle-born and pureblood equality-"

"Okay, get on with it," James said.

"...so anyway, she is bloody brilliant. And the name Bellatores is awesome. So we could be 'the Bellatores.'" Scorpius and James just stared at her blankly for a few moments before Scorpius spoke up.

"That's kind of feminine."

"Well...I'm kind of feminine and you two should get in touch with your feminine sides," Rose snapped. It was clear to both of the boys that they had better not argue with her anymore unless they wanted to get their heads hexed off.

"...Well then, I guess we're the Bellatores," James sighed, "Are you _sure_ you don't want to do something a _little_ more manly?"

Little did James know that that name would stick with him for his entire life.

And before either Rose or Scorpius got to answer him, the woman operating the candy trolley opened the compartment door.

"Do any of you lovely children want some candy? There's Chocolate Frogs, Bertie Botts Every Flavor Beans-"

"Ma'am, how much would the whole lot cost?" Scorpius asked, he and James were already pooling their sickles and knuts together. Rose rolled her eyes.

"The whole _lot?_ Well, now let me see," she said, looking at the prices for the candies, "Beans are two knuts... Chocolate Frogs are... okay, three plus- okay, that would be about three galleons for the whole lot." Scorpius handed her a handful of his coins, and she gave him about thirteen boxes of candies in return.

"Save _some_ room for your dinners, now," she said, laughing as she slowly closed the compartment door.

Scorpius knew that the sorting ceremony would go one of two ways: either James and Rose would be sorted into Gryffindor and he would be sorted into Slytherin, or all three of them would be sorted into Gryffindor. It was one or the other; there was absolutely no chance of some malfunction in the system, both James and Rose were brave as well as friendly, while he himself _wanted_ to be brave and friendly, but he wasn't sure he was.

The castle was warm and comforting as the new friends stepped into Hogwarts for the first time; they all gaped at the glistening chandeliers and they pointed in awe at the spectacular tapestries hanging on the walls in an ode to the schools past. The candlelit hallways flickered as the flames toyed with the darkness, dancing, threatening to make the whole castle completely dark.

"It's much different than I imagined it being," Rose whispered in his ear, the smell of chocolate following her breath. Scorpius nodded, though it wasn't too far off of what he had imagined. It had the same musty smell as his home and the tapestries on the walls matched what his father had told him. It was quite like the imaginary Hogwarts he had pictured in his mind, even the stone floors had been described in such depth to him that they matched the exact color his father had said they would be.

"I'm starved," James grumbled. Rose scowled at him disapprovingly.

"When _aren't_ you starved?" she asked in an annoyed tone. James grimaced.

"I'm always _hungry_, but I'm not always _starved."_

"Bloody hell, we practically ate the whole Honeydukes shop and you're still _hungry?!"_

"No, not hungry, _starved."_

"Oh you poor, decrepit soul," she snapped. James stopped the argument there, knowing

that if he were to press any further, he might as well be dead.

That often happened when James and Rose fought, Rose was not a gentle person, nor was James for that matter. The trio of friends was a determined, headstrong one, and together, he knew they would be respected.

Three people of this sort don't often come by.

"_Students!_" a clear, soprano voice rang out. The voice was harsh, yet in a way, gently stern. It was the distinct voice of Minerva McGonagall, one that would haunt and pester Scorpius for years to come. He looked up at the staircase to see an elderly woman wearing half moon spectacles with long, ghostly white hair that tumbled down her back, barely past her waist and just meeting the belt that was slung across her broad hips and emerald green dress. Over her dress, she wore a thin, almost sheer cloak of the sorts where a knobby, dark wand was stowed in the pocket. She had the markings of someone who had once been beautiful. Her small, yet strangely sharp blue eyes scanned the crowd of students.

_Minerva McGonagall had changed._ Even Scorpius knew this, looking at her with her hair _down_ and not twisted up into a bun. She didn't match her father's description at all.

First of all, she liked being called _Minerva _or Professor by her students, no longer simply 'McGonagall.' She had a new zest for life that she had lost when Voldemort had risen to power; she had felt like life no longer had meaning, and now, in her old age, she had regained it. This was not to be confused with kindness, Minerva McGonagall would _never_ be kind. She would always be stern and harsh, much the same way she always had been; Minerva McGonagall it seemed, was born to teach. She was not to be messed with, yet she still showed gentleness to her students. She would devote hours to them and their learning, and she would go to any length to save them.

"Students," Minerva said again, "I am your headmistress, Minerva McGonagall. _Professor, _or _Minerva_, one or the other, either name will suit me very nicely," she continued, her voice ending the sentences with a high pitched trail leading off into nothingness, "Tonight, each of you will be sorted into the house that best suits you and your personality; each house honors qualities that are worthy of respect." Some of the students giggled at this. Minerva frowned at them with a slight unimpressed gaze and a small pout, and they were quiet at once. "You will follow me into the Great Hall where upon your arrival, the Sorting Hat will sing it's annual song and you will line up." Minerva then proceeded to gracefully walk towards the large doors of the Great Hall, her small, slippered feet making soft noises as they hit the stone floors. Rose, James, and Scorpius, who were towards the front of the group, walked silently after her.

Minerva opened the Great Hall doors with a loud, clanging noise, and the students were led to the stool by the front of the room.

The hat sang it's song, which Scorpius didn't much care for, it was just a hat, in his opinion, and the three friends gathered at the near front of the line. Scorpius went first, then Rose, then James. Scorpius stood behind a girl with caramel colored hair and pigtail braids; she smelled rather nice, like a fresh spring breeze and the flowers that go along with it.

She whirled around in a blur, and Scorpius, was taken aback. He stepped back and accidentally stepped on Rose's foot.

"HEY!" Rose protested as the first student, a short freckled boy with a blond mass of hair approached the hat to be sorted. The girl who had whirled around peered at Scorpius shyly with big, blue eyes.

Her eyes were large and framed by thick black lashes. She had a light dusting of freckles on her rosy cheeks, and her little, dainty nose was square in the center of her face. She played with her caramel braids, the golden locks shimmering in the bright light of the Great Hall. This girl, Scorpius thought, was certainly the prettiest girl he had ever seen.

"What's your name?" the girl whispered to him, her little pink lips forming the words slowly, like she was afraid he wouldn't be able to understand if she went any faster. Scorpius opened his mouth to offer his name, but couldn't speak right away.

"Er, Scorpius."

"That's an interesting name," she said, not in a rude way, but like she thought his name was genuinely interesting. He grinned. Just then, he realized that they were about to call her name and she was about to be sorted.

"I think it's... uh, your turn," he said sheepishly, gesturing to the hat. Again, she whirled around at a sickening speed and walked straight to the platform, as Minerva read the name, "Evenson, Margaret!" Margaret daintily set herself on the stool as Minerva gently set the hat upon Margaret's head.

"GRYFFINDOR!" the hat exclaimed, without a moment's delay. Margaret's lips parted into a beautiful smile as she briskly walked over to the cheering Gryffindors. As she walked, her eyes briefly caught Scorpius's, and she smiled at him.

Now, Scorpius was _really_ nervous. This was the moment that decided it all, who his friends would be, and if the Bellatores would ever come to be true.

He very much wanted them to be, no matter how feminine 'Bellatores' was.

"Good luck," Rose whispered in his ear, and James playfully slapped him on the shoulder.

"Malfoy, Scorpius!"

Palms sweaty, Scorpius shakily walked to the stool, and sat. Minerva dropped the hat on his head, and instantly, Scorpius could feel the hat prodding at his mind, pulling at his thoughts and ripping into the dark crevices of his past. Scorpius squinted, fighting this sensation he was feeling.

_You've got ambitions, _the hat said, _You're brave. Braver than most. Even braver that one who sat here years ago, one who looked an awful lot like that friend of yours back there with the black hair. Even braver than one who sat here even years before with more ambition than I have ever seen._

_Please, _Scorpius begged, _Please don't put me in Slytherin._

_Not Slytherin? _the hat said, surprised, _You could be great. You could do great things._

_I'm not my father,_ Scorpius retorted, _Great things come at a cost._

_You're wise beyond your years, boy, though you don't show it. You could be a Ravenclaw, if you pursue that path-_

_No!_

_You're friendly too! My, what a well rounded child-_

_I'm not a child, and PLEASE just not Slytherin..._

_Well if you're sure..._

_YES I'm sure._

_Then it better be..._

"GRYFFINDOR!"

Scorpius, smiling, handed the hat to Minerva and strided over to the cheering Gryffindor table where he seated himself next to Margaret, making sure to save two seats for his friends because he was fairly certain they, too would join this table.

April 16th, Year 5

"I have Transfiguration next period," Margaret said, smiling at Scorpius, "I hope Divination won't be too dull or dreary for you." Scorpius grinned his annoyingly attractive half grin as they stopped in the empty corridor, the two of them ready to part their separate ways.

"It'll be dull because you're not in it, Mar," he said. His voice was rich and clear; in return, Margaret giggled a bit, and blushed.

"Transfiguration might be dull without you, too," she whispered. Scorpius's eyes lit up.

"I guess we'll both be bored as hell in our separate places with nothing to think about but one another," he confirmed, his grey eyes falling waveringly over her blue ones. "You know, Mar," Scorpius started, "If I didn't know better, I might think you like me." Margaret blushed again, this time biting her lip.

"I'm going to be late for Transfiguration," she said quickly before darting away and leaving Scorpius alone, his heart beating like a wildfire.

He thought he liked her. Or at least it seemed like he did.

She'd been one of his closest friends of his for the past four years, but it was just recently this year that they had been spending a lot more time alone together, studying, laughing, or anything, really.

Margaret was pretty.

But so was she.

Margaret was smart.

She was smarter.

Margaret was brave.

She was braver.

Margaret was witty.

She was wittier.

Margaret, however, might actually accept the fact that he liked her, while _she_ on the other hand, wouldn't. And Scorpius was afraid. Afraid of rejection, afraid of losing their friendship. He knew he wouldn't wait forever, but he would put it off as long as he could; he would try to find other's and see if they could make him feel the same way she did, see if they could sweep him off of his feet the way she did. He liked Margaret just fine, and he thought that maybe if he gave her a fair chance, she could make him feel the same way _she_ did, if not better. He had to give Margaret a chance, and he had to give _her_ a rest.

Anyhow, it didn't _really_ matter to him, romance wasn't really a serious thing to him at all, especially now, as the war was raging and his father fought.

Besides, they were young and stupid, even he knew that. He knew that he didn't like _her_ enough to _love_ her. Sure, as a friend, but not in a romantic way. She was his best mate, and likewise.

And until he _knew_ that until he had fallen too far for _her_, until he knew that he was too deep in to get out, he would keep trying, for the sake of their friendship.

He couldn't lose her.

However, as he knew this, Scorpius fell into the strange, haunting, terrible ways of the high-school heartbreaker.

He was desperate, in an un-desperate kind of way.

"Hey, Scor," Rose said, happily seating herself next to him on the common room couch. The cushion bounced as she landed, and she spilled her books all over the table before them. Scorpius was very aware of the little space between them, he was aware of the closeness of her figure to his, and he was _very_ aware of the way his heart was searing in his chest, with little butterflies fluttering around his stomach, causing his mind to fog up.

She smelled nice. Like... like the tea he saw her drink at breakfast every morning.

She was wearing her glasses, like she always did when she sat down to do her homework, and her hair was pulled back off of her neck, revealing her slim shoulders. His eyes wandered down her figure, where he noticed her sweater: it was a deep red with a golden 'R' knitted across it. He smiled at it, because it was a sweater he knew so well; her grandmother had knitted it for her, in fact, the very same Christmas she had received it, Scorpius had received one of his own. It had been a royal blue with a white 'S' embroidered on it. She wore little, black shorts and blue, fuzzy slippers.

"Hey," he said eventually, his mind choking. As she filed through her pencil-case for a quill, he looked at her books, and seeing that he had some reading to do in some of those particular books, reached out to pick one of them up.

"Hey!" she said, scowling at him, and swatting his arm as he reached for the book, "No! These are mine, I brought them so I could do the reading and take notes in the margins!"

She always took notes in the margins of her textbooks with her blue ink quills.

"You can't _possibly_ read all four books at the same time. Besides, I'm not going to even do it if you don't let me do it now, and you know-"

"Fine, use the bloody book, but don't take _Advanced Astronomy _because that one's the boringest, and I want to get it out of the way."

"I'm not going to read that one, anyway."

"What is it with you and homework? Honestly, its just reading, and you might as well do it, I have all of the resources here for you, and its not like you're going anywhere until I'm done..."

"Okay, but you're not taking into consideration the fact that you read a page in fifteen seconds-"

"Okay. okay, fine, just be sure to get the Transfiguration done, McGonagall's stricter than Coulter, Maddox, and Turnpike combined." He reached for the Transfiguration textbook, as she leaned towards him, her hands caressing his collar.

_Bloody freaking hell she's gonna kiss me_, he thought wildly, frozen where he was.

"Um... er, what are... you-doing?

"Fixing your collar, you prat. It was awful, all turned up..."

"That's because I-"

"Save it, buster, do your homework."

He would've done his homework, he swore he would've, if it weren't for the lurking fact that he had thought his best friend was going to kiss him. Did he want her to kiss him?

No, he told himself, you're not allowed to want her to kiss you, you have to like Margaret, you cannot like _her_, she's out of bounds, you don't even fancy her, you _don't._ You'll find someone else. Just keep looking.

He also would've actually read the Transfiguration text if Rose hadn't looked so incredibly focused and beautiful reading her Astronomy. Her brows were knitted together when she was confused, but then, after she would read the passage over to understand it, she would nod in satisfactory understanding.

"What do you think about it?" she asked him, plopping herself on the couch.

"What?"

"The Third Wizard War."

"Oh," he said, pausing to think for a moment, "I think it's anarchy versus the Ministry." Rose stopped in consideration.

Anarchy. That was really what it was, wasn't it? Anarchy? Chaos versus the world they had grown up in.

Anarchy.

"You're right, I suppose."

"Of course I'm right."

"Shut up," she laughed. He chuckled, then, his stare turned rigid. He gazed up at her with subtle longing, and she looked back in confusion, not understanding.

To her, nothing had changed. They were best mates, still. He couldn't take it forever, and he knew how she felt.

And he hated it.

He hated how she felt.

He hated this war. It was over _nothing_, literally, the government had taken offense to a comment made by a former death eater and had stationed patrols outside his house. He had been furious, (not to mention _drunk_) when he called for backups to get them out of the way. The entire thing had erupted, it had spread slowly, until it had grown larger than any of the wars before; this truly was the war to end all wars.

His father had told him that the Minister of Magic had begun to debate asking the muggle prime minister for help. Draco had been outraged that they might have to look to non-magic folk for help, but then, as the war had gotten progressively worse, he had finally agreed that it might have to be that way.

There were hundreds of things going on that he didn't understand.

"Did you hear about the attack in Dublin?" Rose asked him, leaning back against the armrest of the couch, "72 muggles killed; the entire city had to have their memory wiped."

"What about magic-folk?"

"23."

"Anyone we know?"

"Alicia Longbottom's cousin. The Minister's daughter. My aunt's sister." She shrugged, gazing out the window. Light poured in and decorated her face, her hair and her cloak in splotches of gold. "Do ya' wanna grab James and hit the town?" she suggested, "We might escape seeing Margaret." Scorpius smirked.

Rose hated Margaret. She thought she was a fake, blunt, brat with absolutely no self-control. Scorpius would phrase it differently: she was a popular, honest, girl still with absolutely no self-control.

"Should I bring the fire-butterbeer?"

"Hell yes."

"How much?" Rose shrugged.

"Enough so we can do something stupid and get into trouble." Scorpius chuckled, and stood up, running his pale fingers through his already messy hair.

"So... a bottle for the each of us?"

"Do we drink too much?" she giggled.

"...or not enough."

"_You_ are the one who smokes."

"Do not."

"Do too."

"Only like once a month."

"How many cigarette packages do you own?"

"One. And it's lasted me all year long."

"You only smoke when you're nervous. I've noticed." He didn't respond, he just gazed

down at her with a cool self-possession that was so fierce she turned away, pretending to study the clock. "We don't have classes tomorrow," she murmured.

"I know," he sighed, "I'm writing Minerva's essay tomorrow."

"You'll be hungover."

"After one bottle? I won't even be slightly tipsy. I'm going to water your's down so you don't go all crazy on us and start trying to kiss your cousin."

"You'll be tipsy, and you'd better not water mine down-"

"...because you want to do something crazy tonight?"

"We'll see," she laughed, standing up and walking towards her dorm, "I'll meet you and James out here in five minutes, I've gotta change, and you had better get a bag for the fire."

"Have you ever wondered what it would be like if I hadn't sat down in the train car with you guys that first year?" Rose inquired, as the two boys talked Quidditch.

"...Do you think Hufflepuff's really that good this year?"

"-Yeah, we've got to train really hard if we want to beat them."

"...Hm. How do you think we can outplay them, if they're so much stronger than us?"

"I really have no idea. We'll have to talk it over with Kingsley."

"...I hope you both know that I am not fluent in Quidditch..." Rose tried to interject as they continued their conversation. Rose walked ahead of them, looking back at the two of them, who didn't seem to notice her absence.

She was angry. Really quite angry.

James was supposed to be her best cousin. He was supposed to stick up for her and be a best mate, all the time: not half the time. Scorpius was supposed to be an idiot and a prat, which he was doing a great job of, but he was _also_ supposed to be a gentleman when he wasn't being stupid.

And guess what? He wasn't being stupid _or_ gentlemanly.

She scowled and held the sleeves of her sweater as she briskly walked away from the boys, tugging the bottom of her shorts down so they were just above mid-thigh.

She didn't like what was happening to the boys. James was more distracted than ever. He hardly paid any attention to her anymore, he was always too busy spending time with Scor, playing Quidditch, or flirting. He had become a bit of a bad-boy in the eyes of the student population, and he was popular. Scor was too, but he was more of a heartbreaker than a bad-boy, he went from girl to girl without the slightest sign of emotion. James was simply ignoring her. It hurt. She knew she was the only girl in the Bellatores. She knew that the boys were best mates, and she was kind of the awkward third-friend, but then again, that could be said for any of them.

Scor was worrying her. He smoked sometimes, though you wouldn't be able to tell. (he used magic to wipe away the smell, clean his teeth, and keep his skin alright.) Magic couldn't help his lungs though, which worried her because she had known friend's parents who had died from lung cancer, and if there was anything more terrible, it was probably getting eaten alive by human sized arachnids.

And Margaret worried her, too. Margaret was a slut. A slutty, slaggish, awful atrocity placed on this Earth to seduce and hurt men. She was a brat. She was sassy, brutally honest, and rudely unfaithful. And she had her eyes on one person: Scorpius Malfoy.

It wouldn't seem like she did though, she was, as said above, a slut, and she took great joy in breaking hearts and kissing boys (usually boys). She was lazy, and overall, completely immature when it came to her 'relationships'.

Scorpius on the other hand, was and had just recently become heart-breaker supreme, and she knew that he would have no trouble screwing around with Margaret for a little while before turning to the next victim of his vicious ways.

Rose hated the way he went from girl to girl like it didn't matter to him. It was like he didn't care about anyone's emotions, he didn't care for anyone but himself.

He was stupid, greedy, and ignorant.

He was her best mate.

Rose stopped walking when she finally reached the Three Broomsticks, where upon her entrance, she saw Grace Chang in the corner of the restaurant crying, downing butterbeer by the second (probably because it was the only legal drink that could make her tipsy), and burying her face into the firm chest of Avery Thomas.

Grace Chang was pretty in a way that not many people are. She was a very sentimental sort of girl, yet, somehow, she still managed to be wild and crazy. She was brilliant, she always competed with Rose for top of the year along with Scor. Her mother was Asian, and her father was African, giving Grace perfect, milk-chocolate skin, golden-brown almond eyes, and full pink lips. She had thick, curly hair, and she was tall: about 5'10''. Rose knew her well, she was certainly one of Rose's best female friends, alongside Elise Davis and Anna Knowles. Her boyfriend, Avery Thomas, had short, blond hair, dull, blue eyes, and a smile that could make any day infinitely better. He was good to Grace, and she was sweet to him.

They were a very sweet couple.

It made Rose jump to see her in such a state, and Avery didn't seem to be making much of a difference, so Rose, cautiously walked over to their table. She was sure not to seem like she was intruding, because she wasn't sure this was any of her business.

"H-have them... f-f-fill i-it u-up ag-gain," Grace sobbed, handing Rose the glass. Surprised, she looked at Avery for reassurance.

_Please_, he mouthed, _Ask them to water it down a bit, she's going bonkers._ Rose, knowing this was certainly not a time to be smiling, nodded somberly before intertwining herself between the tables until she reached the bar.

A middle-aged waitress who showed signs of once being lovely, came to help her.

"Need any help, love?" she asked Rose. Rose, handed the woman the glass, which sparkled in the dim light of the restaurant.

"Can you filled this with... _really_ watered down butterbeer?" Rose asked, glancing back at Grace, who was _positively _drunk now. The woman nodded politely, and waved her wand, instantly filling the glass full of butterbeer. Rose nodded in thanks.

"You can charge... that boy over there-"

"Oh, he's already bought thirteen mugs of the stuff, it's complementary now." _Wow._ Thirteen glasses of butterbeer?

"Um... alright, thank you ma'am." The waitress nodded, and turned around to help another customer. Rose arrived at the table, setting the glass down and eyeing the couple.

_What the hell could have possibly happened to the poor girl?_

"Um, I don't know if this is my place to ask, but I think...? I think that you and I are fairly decent friends, and...-"

"And you want to know wha' this is about?" Grace finished dryly, spluttering butterbeer. Rose nodded, and crossed her arms, sitting down at the booth with the two of them. "Ya know, Rose, I think it might help a lil' bit tew talk abou' this a lil'... it'll help me ge' o'r it..." Grace slurred, her wild, crazed eyes dancing all over Rose. Rose smiled warmly.

"What happened?"

"Ma mum," Grace choked, "She died." Rose's eyes grew wide as her hand flew to cover her mouth.

"No," Rose said, "In Dublin?"

"Yeah," Grace whispered, silent tears slipping out of her eyes, "My dad phoned in an 'our or so ago..."

"How?" Rose started, "Oh my- bloody hell, Grace, I'm so sorry-"

"_Sorry doesn't help,"_ Grace hissed, her eyes red in fury, "_Sorry won't bring her BACK." _Avery placed a hand lightly over Grace's, and squeezed it to steady her. "She was tortured. They got the memory from her 'fore she died. They took 'er to St. Mungo's... my dad said she was all bloody... And her body was mauled... She barely lasted twenty minutes before... before- 'fore she... s-s-she died." She sobbed, turning to Avery, and burying herself in his deep blue sweater.

"I- I- n-never got to say g'bye, Avery... She's dead... and all I ever did was complain... I tol' her how angry I was at e'rone, bu' I ne'r told her how much I loved her... An' now she's gone, an' now... Avery, I love you... And Rose...," Grace cried, looking over at her friend with big puffy eyes, " 'Ave you e'r lost somebody tha' you loved?"

Rose's heart wrenched in two, at that moment, to see her friend in such pain, to see her friend in such distress positively killed her.

The war was real.

Losing people was real.

Death was real.

_Losing people was real._

She refused to lose anyone. She wouldn't lose Scor. She wouldn't lose James. They were her best friends, and she couldn't lose them.

Rose sighed.

Not really. She hadn't really lost anyone.

But she might.

She might if she didn't do something soon.

"Almost," Rose concluded. Grace nodded.

"Who?"

"My best friend."

"How?"

"I... I let him slip away."

"Why?"

This question struck her with such sincerity, she wasn't sure what to say.

She knew why though.

It was because she was afraid of him and what he was beginning to represent to her. He was growing larger than he had been, so she had begun to push him away while staying with him.

"He started meaning something that-"

"You fell in love?" Grace asked, her red eyes shining with wisdom and honestly, flames and embers of burning knowledge.

No, Rose hadn't been in love with Scorpius Malfoy. She had liked him, sure, but she hadn't been in love.

He had begun to represent risk and growing changes in her life, rebeling, and youth. He was youth. He smoked. He drank. He didn't worry about the future. He loved in an unloving way. He was passionate. He was unblinking. He was impulsive.

Rose was representative of the wise youth, smart, conservative, witty. She was gracefully on fire, she was a flame with an edge of ice. She worried about the future, but he had begun to take that away from her. She loved in a deep, frighteningly honest way. She, too, was passionate. She was sentimental. She was dramatic.

She knew herself well enough to know that a life with no regrets was certainly not the way she lived.

She also knew herself well enough to know that she so desperately _yearned_ for a life with no regrets.

But it scared her.

Youth scared her.

Her mother had always told her that she was an eighty-year old stuck in a sixteen year old body.

She wasn't free, happy, and impulsive by nature.

He was.

He frightened her.

But he also meant something so deep, so disturbingly special and genuine to her, that losing him would ruin her life.

He was undoubtedly teaching her that a life with no regrets was the best life that one could possibly lead. Youth. Happiness. Freedom.

Scorpius.

"No, not love," Rose whispered, still deep in thought.

"Who was it?" Grace inquired, and Rose, knowing that Grace was hopelessly drunk, decided to tell her.

"Scorpius." Grace smiled a crooked smile.

"You.. two would be- cute."

"He's my best friend, things would never work out that way-"

"Okay Grace," Avery finally piped up, "Don't press it." Grace scowled at him. Rose eyed Avery.

She didn't know the bloke, yet now he knew something she had been hiding for a while. She thought he seemed trustworthy enough, he wouldn't spread her secrets around the school for the spite of being awful.

Avery Thomas was quite the opposite of James Potter, Rose thought.

He was like art, hard to understand, not beautiful though, because art is not meant to be beautiful. It's supposed to make you feel something, and Avery Thomas certainly did make everyone feel something.

The pub bustled with electricity, people walked in and out of the old, oak doors, gusts of wind following them. The sounds of , "How can I help you today?" echoing out of sugar voices filled their ears, and images of couples talking over a glass of fire-butterbeer were in the corners of their eyes.

"I'm... I'm sorry you had to see her like this," Avery said gently to Rose. Grace simply laid her head against the table, tears slipping out of her eyes.

"It's alright. My friends were being arses so I left them, and... and here I am. I needed to talk about this though, it's been eating at my mind for a while."

"Do you want to actually talk about it with someone who's sane?" Avery asked, smiling. Rose smirked.

"I... I- suppose..."

"I swear I won't tell a soul. Grace isn't going to remember tonight-"

"I trust you, Avery."

"-Um, thanks?"

"...Let the therapy session begin."

"What's wrong."

And it all flew out of her mouth. Everything from James's ignorance to Scorpius's smoking and distance, what he was representing, and how he was scaring her.

Avery listened, nodding somberly or laughing when it was appropriate. Grace moaned as she began to close her eyes and drift to sleep, every once and a while making a comment about, 'purple diham...' which Rose decided was a drunken slumbered version of saying 'purple diamond.'

When she was finally done, Avery smiled a bit, before frowning for a moment.

"Speaking as a guy, I would say... talk to them. They probably have no idea that they're upsetting you so much, and talking to them might open their eyes."

Rose knew one thing: there was no way in _hell_ that she would ever tell the boys she was irritated at them, they would flip out, and she would be in deep trouble.

"Guys are so dumb."

"...Scorpius is brilliant, and James isn't too shabby in the brain department..."

"Eh... they haven't noticed that I'm cross."

"I wouldn't have noticed."

"Then you're dumb too."

"Well, gee, thanks."

"Thanks for the therapy session, I-"

And she was cut off by an urgent voice.

"ROSE!" She whirled around to see a windswept Scor and James step into the restaurant, a brisk wind flooding the room. Scor's hair was wild and so was James's, as their eyes darted around the room searching for Rose.

James saw her first, sighing in relief, then pointing her out to Scor before the two of them glided over to see her.

"Rose! We were panicked looking for you-"

"You were?"

"Of course!" Scor said, giving her a weird look, "You're our best mate!" Rose beamed at the title.

"Let's go," James said, tugging on Rose's arm, "We have trouble to get into."

They were at the lake now, and the sun was just starting to set, painting the lake orange and yellow.

Rose didn't really want to get into trouble anymore.

She was in shock, still, and she had to be sober enough not to let words tumble out of her lips unknowingly. Scor could not know what she had told Avery or the drunken Grace.

_THAT was confidential._

"Here," James said, sipping from the bottle of fire-butterbeer, then passing it to her. Rose took the bottle, pressed it to her lips, then took a gulp of the clear, crystal, liquid. It burned her throat, then warmed her stomach.

It was white-fire.

She looked over at Scor, her hair falling over her face.

"Hey! You brought the white fire!" He smiled devilishly at her as he crossed his legs and rolled the sleeves of his collared, white shirt up. His hair was slightly disheveled, and his feet were bare.

And in that moment, Rose no longer wondered why all of the girls seemed to love him. He was smart. He was insanely handsome. He was a character.

"Of course I brought it, it's the best," he laughed.

What Rose didn't know was that he had brought it for _her._ It was her favorite, and he knew it. He also knew that would make her happy, and her happiness made him happy.

He had simply been doing himself a favor.

They all were slightly tipsy, if not totally drunk.

With every sip Rose took, she reminded herself that it was butterbeer.

It was legal. She wasn't breaking rules.

Rose would never break rules.

But she was drunk.

And when people are drunk, they break rules.

_Even_ Rose Weasley.

The three of them were in the water, splashing and laughing.

Rose threw a giant splash at James, and in return, he threw one back, getting her hair wet.

"THERE'S A SQUID IN THIS LAKE," Scorpius yelled, laughing at himself, "DID YOU KNOW THAT?" His hair was wet and glued to his face. Rose threw another wave at him. He didn't return one. Even tipsy, he still loved her enough not to do anything that might provoke the monster.

"You idiot, Avery told me that."

"Avery?"

"Yeah," Rose said, giggling and rolling her eyes before turning around to James who was eyeing a tentacle suspiciously. "JAMES!" she hollered at him, "DIDN'T AVERY TELL ME ABOUT THE GIANT SQUID?"

"Uh huh," James muttered, poking the tentacle. The tentacle swatted him in the face. "HEY!"

"See," Rose said turning around to Scorpius, "Avery helps me. He told me about the squid, and about how to deal with you."

"With me?" Scorpius said, paying very close attention, "Aren't I your best mate? You already know how to deal with me."

"Not really, dumb-arse." He smirked.

"You're preeetttyy." She scowled at him, and pushed his chest, and he tumbled into the water, and dark indigo drops of water flew into her eyes.

"Are you sober, Scor?" He laughed.

"I suppose. More sober than you, you think that Avery told you about me and the giant squid."

"I'm sober!"

"Ha! In your dreams."

"I bet I'll remember all of this tomorrow." Scorpius smiled and took a daring step toward her. They stood face to face, chest to chest.

"Well, tell me if you remember _this_ tomorrow."

One must remember that Scorpius Malfoy wasn't half as sober as he claimed he was.

One must also remember that he like Rose Weasley very much.

He also would _never_ have dreamed of doing what he was about to do were he sober.

Her cheeks were warm with his fire-tainted breath as he studied her electric blue eyes.

And he remembered.

He remembered seeing her in the train car for the very first time, his eyes meeting her's for the first time, their friendship igniting.

And Rose was too intoxicated to remember that he was her best friend, and he shouldn't be this close, and his grey eyes shouldn't have been that gorgeous.

His eyes were her weakness.

He moved closer, until his lips almost met her cheek.

"You have three eyes," Rose pointed out, bluntly, pointing at him. Scorpius stopped, (almost catching himself) and smirked.

Someday, these would all be stories.

Tomorrow, none of them would remember this.

"James," Rose, whispered to her cousin. He moaned, his head throbbing in pain, a memory that was burned into his mind. "JAMES," she bellowed, and his eyes fluttered open.

"What the hell do you want, you arse." She smirked at him, her arms crossed.

"I don't remember anything from last night," she confessed, "Did I do anything stupid?"

"I think... I think- I have this weird memory of a giant squid tossing me ashore and... a giant man hulling me completely out of the water..."

"You mean me. And you also mean that moment when you poked the giant squid's tentacle and it slapped you, then you slapped it back, yelling at it that it ought to 'respect it's elders', and then it threw you, and I helped you out of the water," Scorpius said, leaning against a tree, his eyes matching the morning sky perfectly.

"Did you drink at _all?_" James asked in awe, "How do you _remember_ that..."

"James," Scor said, laughing, "You must know that we only drank a little. Not really... safe drinks, but they're legal, if we bend the rules a bit. And I only had a little."

"Scor," James said, chuckling, shaking his head, "You sure looked like one giant of a man." Scorpius rolled his eyes.

"Did I do anything that stupid?" Rose begged. Scorpius turned to her, and held his breath.

He remembered. He remembered perfectly.

But he would not say a word.

Not a word.

Year 4, April 18th

Elise Davis wasn't simply pretty, she was fire. She was sassy, and she was spicy, but she was _never_ sweet. Messing with Elise Davis was like playing with flames, she either hurt someone, or she _severely_ hurt someone. Elise Davis was not the sort of girl who liked to be taken advantage of.

She was average height, about 5'4'', with chin length, perfectly smooth jet black hair. She had a strong jaw that she clenched when she was mad, and she had red lips that would draw into a thin line when she was furious. She had shiny, bright eyes that seemed to have sparks dancing in them, and she had thick, arching brows painted above them.

Elise was one of those ultra-feminist, ultra-liberal, incredibly well-informed people who could never take anyone else's opinion seriously. To her, her way was the only way.

Perhaps one of the reasons Rose liked Elise so much was because she was like fire. Rose was like fire too, and together they created an inextinguishable flame that would never go out.

"Elise Davis, you could not have failed that test." Rose retorted.

"Oh, but I did."

"You see, I _actually_ got a 'T' on it, you couldn't have too."

"I got worse than a 'T'."

"I've never heard of that, you idiot, that makes no sense."

"I've given up on making sense."

"You're mad."

"I know."

Elise tossed her hair, and Rose threw out an arm to tuck a piece back into place.

"On a scale of one to ten, how bad does my hair look," Elise asked. Her hair looked rather tragically messy. Pieces stuck out at odd angles,

When Elise Davis asked for an answer, she was not looking for any sugar-coated answers. She was looking for the blunt, even brutally honest truth.

"About a five point five," Rose answered truthfully.

"Well, I don't care," Elise said smiling, whirling around, clutching her books tightly to her chest.

Rose wasn't entirely sure, but she thought Elise actually _liked_ looking disheveled.

Elise was gorgeous. And when the word gorgeous is used to describe Elise Davis, it should not be taken lightly. She was prettier than Rose or Margaret, even though she so desperately tried to disguise it. She never wore makeup. (Not that she needed to, she already had impeccable skin and long lashes.) Still, boys looked her way because she was so naturally beautiful.

Elise Davis didn't want to be pretty. She wanted boys to look at her and be reminded that not everything was theirs for the taking, not everything was easy, and not everyone wanted to be seen as feminine and beautiful.

Elise Davis failed miserably at that. Her willowy figure and inevitable beauty were impossible to hide.

"Did you hear about that bloke at the Ministry who was tortured? They say his best mate said that he was going to attack the Minister if he didn't release the man," Elise said, turning a corner of the castle so abruptly, that Rose was left behind, confused.

"-Wait, this isn't the way we normally walk to Divination-"

"So? It's time for a change in routine. About the bloke at the Ministry?"

"Um, okay. I heard about him, his name was Aaron Tymore. But I also heard that the only reason the Ministry is torturing him is because he mentioned something about an upcoming rebel attack."

"Oh, lovely," Elise said sarcastically, "Our government is scared by a drunk guy who mentioned-"

"He was a... a you know..."

"A death eater?" Elise said boldly. Even then, years after the first two wizarding wars, the word 'death eater' was one whispered behind cupped hands and slipped under doors. Only the brave dared to say it aloud.

"...Y-yes," Rose said softly, "Don't you think they have a right to be afraid-"

"Do _you_ think they have a right to torture him?"

"Well, yes I do. He was... was a- a _death eater."_

"I do suppose you're right. They say when they searched his house, he still had his... death eater robes, I guess you'd call them." The two girls looked at the ground for a moment, their Divination books clutched close to their chests, Elise's bright red nails pressing into her porcelain skin.

"Did he ever assault them?" Rose whispered.

"Yes. I think so. After they said he would be tortured if he didn't give answers."

"...Did he use an Unforgivable Curse?"

"Yes. He dazed all the guards, then he used the Cruciatus curse on the Minister, but only for a moment. He was captured within seconds." Rose didn't respond for a second, as her thoughts raced in her fragile, innocent mind. She had never known pain. She knew a limited amount of information about fear.

If this was real, it would force her to face both.

"...Do you think it's happening? For real?" she asked cautiously.

Rose Weasley was no coward. She was a Gryffindor. She was afraid, but fear does not mean that you are not brave. Facing your fear is brave, you are only a coward if you refuse to face your fear.

However, she was not looking for any sugar-coated answer. Rose and Elise's friendship was very blunt and honest, there would be no lies, no deception, and no fakeness involved in it.

"Yeah," Elise said, drawing her wand out of her pocket as the two of them rounded the corner to face the ladder leading up to the Divination room, "It definitely is happening." Both Elise and Rose set their books on the ground as Elise raised her wand to levitate the books up into the room. "_Wingardium Leviosa_," Elise muttered, as the books fluttered into life, and flew up the ladder into the opening in the ceiling, "Good gosh I hate that spell, honestly." Rose smiled slightly as Elise started the climb up the fragile wooden ladder.

The Divination room was now snuck away in a corner of the castle, on a separate floor of it's own. A wooden ladder rose from the floor of the third floor of the school to the reserved fourth, little carvings inscribed into it. Of course, there were the traditional decorative carvings of lions running rampant and medieval knights and beasts, but there was also the occasional inscription of a 'LE+JP' or a 'SM+CO' or something of the sort. Rose loved to trace her fingertips across the carvings to feel the smooth surfaces of the carvings against her bare skin.

The room, too, was something of a fantastical kind of thing to Rose. There were red and purple curtains slung across the windows (which were always open, whether it be winter or spring), the tea kettle was always bubbling with some sort of lovely fragrance perfuming the classroom, the walls were littered with shelves covered in all sorts of trinkets. There were unicorn horns (that still glowed), there were vials of ogre saliva, there were maps of territories unknown or still undiscovered by muggles, and there were paintings and old black-and-white photographs of muggles in Paris.

Rose had a knack for Divination that no one else seemed to have.

Elise was poor at it, and so were James and Scorpius, though Scorpius was a hell of a lot better than James or Elise.

Rose and Elise dropped their books off at their desks before rejoining again in the middle of the room.

**Aaron Tymore's parents, Juliana and Edward Tymore were a death eaters in the late 1970's, following out Voldemort's wishes even after he was gone. Aaron Tymore was never a truly active death eater, though, he disliked working under someone else's rules. **

**As an adult, Aaron Tymore was about 6'5'', muscular yet lean, and incredibly handsome.**

**There's about a one man a century as handsome as Aaron Tymore.**

**He had dark, wavy locks that fell halfway down his forehead and brown eyes.**

**Fierce brown eyes with gold flecks.**

**I always wondered if there could have been an alternative where Aaron Tymore could have turned out good.**

**There was.**

**He was ambitious, he wanted to be respected, he feared being laughed or scoffed at. He feared what his parents had faced. They had trusted a leader, and he had let them down, he had betrayed them. **

**Is there anything more humiliating than being publicly proven wrong?**

**They had been arrested, leaving little Aaron to the government to deal with.**

**They entrusted his life into the hands of his widowed great aunt.**

**His great aunt, (a squib) Petunia Tymore, had treated him with kindness and had always made it certain that he was clean behind his ears and always had drunk his milk before bed. **

**Her morals were certainly in the right places.**

**However, she was elderly, and lost her life to lung cancer due to her old smoking habit.**

**Again, Aaron had been let down. Publicly.**

**Aaron was tired of being let down.**

**He was tired of loving only to have his heart torn. **

**He was tired of waiting until he was an adult to take control of his life.**

**So Aaron Tymore took control. **

**He ran away from the government and he ran away from his past.**

**He ran away from loving, and he ran away from his great aunt's memory.**

**He lived on the streets as an eight year old, scrounging for meals, and searching for a friend. **

**He grew bitter.**

**As he lived on these empty streets, searching for food, searching for life, searching for answers, he decided that he would never live like this again. He would always have it all, he would be the best of the best, and he would do whatever it took to get there.**

**Ambition drove him to survive.**

**On the streets he found he could do things. He could convince a vendor to give him food for free. He could levitate a whole cart of fruit with simply his mind.**

**He knew he was different.**

**He wasn't surprised at all when he received his Hogwarts letter. **

**(He didn't remember magic, he had been too young to remember his parents using it at all, and his aunt, being a squib, had chosen to ignore the lifestyle.)**

**Upon being sorted into Slytherin, any piece of remaining goodness within himself died.**

**He knew who he was, and who he wanted to become.**

**I pity the boy who became Aaron Tymore.**

**Aaron Tymore married Sydney Stull. **

**He did not love her. **

**He would never love again.**

**They had one son: Warren Tymore. **

**Warren looked like his father.**

**He was a dashing fellow, with the handsome features of his father, but the platinum blond hair of his mother.**

**Warren Tymore was stupid.**

**Warren Tymore followed anything that his father said. **

**Warren Tymore appeared to be smart because he repeated what his father said, and his father was smart.**

**As I said above, Aaron would never love again.**

**Loving caused heartbreak.**

**And heartbreak caused pain.**

**So Aaron Tymore did not love his son.**

**Aaron Tymore had no trouble using Warren to gather information from the blood traitor.**

**He needed this information to follow through with his promises to himself, the promises he had made to himself when he was a child.**

**Warren agreed.**

**And Aaron was pleased.**

**The shadow-puppet would surely be successful.**

**There was no way it could fail, the potion was bulletproof.**

**It was impossible to resist.**

**I pity the man that Aaron Tymore had become.**

It all began in fourth year.

Anna Knowles.

Chaser on the Gryffindor Quidditch team, close friends with Rose Weasley and Elise Davis, and Honor's student.

She was decently pretty, but she certainly wasn't beautiful.

Anna Knowles was a thinker, not a talker. She didn't share what was on her mind, but boy, oh boy, she certainly had a mind.

A beautiful one, too.

Her father worked in close relations with the Minister of Magic, and her mother worked as an Auror, capturing former death eaters and such.

She had a close relationship with her father, they got along well. Her relationship with her mother was decent. They fought occasionally about small problems. Anna seemed to make a mountain out of a molehill in these arguments, so she claimed that she never got along with her mother.

She kept a diary.

She liked to draw.

She liked to write.

She was athletic.

It seemed that she had _everything_ going for her.

But something was penetrating the beautiful mind of Anna Knowles.

Something evil, whispering evil thoughts to her, telling her she would be happy if only she listened and did everything she was told.

She was called the 'shadow puppet', as Aaron Tymore liked to call her.

Year 5, December 15th

_Dear Diary,_

_Something very strange is happening. _

_It's been going on for a little while now, perhaps a few months, at least since the start of school. Come to think of it now, I can't exactly put my finger on when it started..._

_There's a voice. I can't quite tell if it's the voice of a man or a woman, and I have no idea who the hell it is. It whispers to me now, but somehow, when it's there, I don't feel as afraid. The voice comforts me, it's soothing in a velvety way, but I know it's evil._

_It told me that I shouldn't be afraid to tell Warren Tymore about what father said._

_My father has always written to me and told me about his work, how it's going, and what's happening in my mother's life. I know they both have important jobs. Together, their two fields practically run the government. _

_I know I shouldn't tell Warren Tymore about my father's work. _

_I know enough about the past and I pay enough attention in History of Magic to know that the Tymore family is nothing but bad news. I've heard the name several times._

_The voice has been urging me to tell Warren about dad's work for a while. I've been able to resist, but now, it's getting harder and harder..._

_I think I should probably tell him a little bit just to see if the voice stops. _

_Who knows? Perhaps it will._

_And also, maybe Warren isn't as bad as the rest of his family. Maybe he's a spy for the Ministry who's secretly with our side._

_- Anna_

_P.S. Please don't think that I'm subject to a creepy controlling voice, because really, I'm not, it's just kind of... there. It doesn't bother me in the slightest, I swear I'm alright._

_P.P.S Don't tell father._

Anna Knowles had long, dark curly locks that she found incredibly hard to manage, so she solved the solution by winding it up into a bun almost daily. She had hazel eyes and freckles, she looked rather like a woodland nymph (or the pictures in the textbooks of woodland nymphs). She was simply pretty.

Anna Knowles was gentle, but she was not sweet. She was opinionated. She was smart, but she was open to other people's opinions. Perhaps _too_ open.

**Elise Davis and Anna Knowles were best friends, you see, because Anna was gentle like water, and Elise was harsh like fire. Together they clashed, but they say clashing can sometimes make up the best relationships.**

**They had been since first year.**

**Elise and Anna had been roommates for just as long.**

**They knew each other's deepest, darkest secrets, they knew each other's flaws, and they knew each other's strengths. They knew each other inside and out.**


End file.
